


sharp edges

by raiindust



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-21
Updated: 2018-09-21
Packaged: 2019-07-15 02:44:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16053791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raiindust/pseuds/raiindust
Summary: It’s hard, those first few days on the Ark; harder than they ever could have imagined, given that most of the seven once called it ‘home’. As a group they work slowly, salvaging what they can from the remnants of a civilisation that lived among the stars then fell to earth, only to watch it be consumed once more by brilliant emboldened flames.Post S4. Bellamy withdraws into himself on the Ark. Raven helps him recover.





	sharp edges

**Author's Note:**

  * For [icouldnotsee (herprettysleeper)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/herprettysleeper/gifts).



> For icouldnotsee, who prompted: hurt/comfort trope.
> 
> I sincerely hope this falls somewhere close to what you envisioned for this prompt. There's a trigger warning for slight self-harm, that falls a little over half-way through, nothing too graphic or gory but something that warrants mentioning. 
> 
> (Also, shout out to the amazing [semele](https://archiveofourown.org/users/semele/pseuds/semele) who beta'ed this for me. All remaining mistakes are mine and mine alone.)

 

It’s hard, those first few days on the Ark; harder than they ever could have imagined, given that most of the seven once called it ‘home’. As a group they work slowly, salvaging what they can from the remnants of a civilisation that lived among the stars then fell to earth, only to watch it be consumed once more by brilliant emboldened flames.

 

There are memories in this place, moments that haunt while they sleep, hover when they wake: of a life once lived, before a hundred children were flung to the ground. ‘Home’ is a relative construct, after all, a feeling, not a place, and feelings live brighter and bolder, or deeper and darker, deep within the soul.

 

“Do you think they regret it?” Raven finds herself asking, when she and Bellamy are alone in their room.

 

(They took to sharing after several days of silence, once they realised that being together, even with all their fear and loathing, was still a better option than being alone.

 

The others, well -- they sorted themselves, in a way that made sense to them. With only seven human, seven breaths, seven heartbeats on the ring, for once in their lives there is space to spare.)

 

But she’s met with silence, cold and steeled, and she marks it down as another day that Bellamy Blake has sat by the window and watched the world burn.

 

\--

 

The longer they are there the easier it becomes. Monty figures out the food situation, and algae has never tasted better than it does when he finally gets it’s right. The relief to have something solid in their bellies is so great that for a moment the tension between them, between grounder and spaceman, friend and foe, begins to ebb away into the light.

 

Only for a moment though, before they remember: they are here, when others are not. Raven can see the change, as Bellamy remembers all those people he left behind, and all those who had to die to that they could live. She can see so clearly in his eyes the sense of failure engulfing him, until he is nothing more than a shell of the man who saved the world.

 

“It’s not on you,” She says to him one night, eyes locked on the ceiling imagining the constellation of stars beyond to rests just beyond the walls. “You did everything you could, to make sure the _best_ of humanity survived.”

 

And it should be enough, coming from her; from the person who was crushed by the _worst_ ; while he managed to forever see the light. Except she was never able to see the problem like he was. She was never able to love the earth like him.

 

It broke her.

 

And for the first time she wonders whether falling to earth after the sister he was never supposed to have might have broken him too?

 

\--

 

Another day etched against the wall. Fifty-six and counting, one thousand, seven hundred and seventy to go.

 

“Harper was hoping that maybe you could show her how to sew?” Raven says softly. “Everything we brought with us is getting tatty, but she and Echo have found some stuff that was left behind.”

 

It’s a matter of waiting, but as she talks to Bellamy’s back, she can see, even in the shadowed room, the gauntness of his figure. It’s been days now, where he hasn’t even left this space, and now: another question goes left unanswered.

 

Instead, he curls his body up into itself and leaves nothing but silence between them.

 

\--

 

Somehow, _always_ has turned into this:

 

A voice, whispered, begging: “Please Bellamy, you need to eat something.”

 

A sob, strangled, desperate: “I didn’t do anything. I left her behind. I let them burn.”

 

A furious, aching, impossible silence.

 

She was never good at this. Not before, not now. Where others would seek comfort, she would seek control: over a problem, towards a solution. And the result of everything she’s ever done in her life means that Raven Reyes was rarely stumped.

 

But in the darkness, with Bellamy Blake, she can’t see a way out. There is no more light, no more hope, just a shell of a man, and a life of regret.

 

\--

 

It’s only when his fist connects with Murphy’s face, does Raven begin to see the shape of who Bellamy once was.

 

And it takes everything in her to push herself between them; to not let Bellamy pummel his way back to himself.

There’s a rage in his eyes that had long since dimmed: bright and bold and beautiful, and Raven hates, _hates_ the way her heart leaps in her chest because this Bellamy, this boy with the sharp edges and hard hands, this is the boy she remembers, from long, long ago --

 

Oh no, she remembers thinking, this one is trouble.

 

A laugh escapes her lips, and she can sense the way Bellamy contorts his features

(bloodied and bruised and broken); the way he tries, desperately, to move from her gaze.

 

“He really did a number on you this time.”

 

She’s rewarded with a half chuckle; half wince, and she watches studiously as he shifts his body to hold his left side tightly.

 

Together, they take a shared breath: in, out, in out.  

 

(And in that breath, they are somewhere else. Somewhere warm and green, with the light of a morning tugging on their hearts --)

 

But it fades like always, and all that remains is the smell of sweat on their skin and blood on their lips.

 

“You can’t keep doing this, picking fights on a whim. Eventually Murphy won’t be the only one willing to fight back.”

 

Moments pass, another breath exhaled: and the silence begins to suffocate.

 

“God, Bellamy! You seem to have forgotten that we’re all hurting too.”

 

\--

 

It takes seventy-one days for him to truly fall to pieces (because there is always something _more_ to be broken).

 

Seventy-one days: of silence, of punishment, of hating them and hating himself more for having the _audacity_ to survive.

 

She finds him, at the end of the corridor. Blood smeared across his cheeks, a hand cradled in his lap. Instinctively, she glances for the shadow of a second broken boy but instead finds a hole carved out in the wall.

 

And the realisation dawns (like a dimming star on the lost horizon): he did this to himself.

 

Hovering on the edge, of him, of them, of the choices he makes, Raven sighs, and says (like a chide): “You can’t keep blaming yourself for humanities mistakes Bellamy, only Atlas was condemned to shoulder the world.”

 

Her body moves slowly, stubbornly (almost against her will) until she is crowding down into his space. He tenses underneath her, whatever muscle he has left tries to fight her off. But in the end he is little more than skin and bone, and long after this moment she will always, always remember this:

 

All it took was seventy-one days for him to come undone.

 

Neither move, from their crumpled little heap, and Raven listens on as his body rises and falls with wracked sobs spilling from his lips: a death march in mourning, for the boy he was, and the man he never had the choice to become.

 

\--

 

“You need to stop.” Raven says sharply, pushing his form into the chair and reaching for the few medical supplies they managed to salvage between the pod and the Ark.

 

He winces, at the movement, and she pushes a little harder: a seemingly fitting punishment to fit the crime. Still, he remains impassive, a stoic soldier born of war: destined, perhaps, to always play the part.

 

(Of sadness, and self-sacrificing, a part she’s also played all too well.)

 

He gives her nothing, so she pushes again, roughly, against flesh torn open by shiny metal.

 

“Shit, Raven.” He sucks in a breath, and drags his hand back, and finally, finally, his eyes meet hers, and she can almost see him, her boy from earth with bright eyes and rough skin that snarled against her neck: a bite of something she’d never seen before, a leader waiting, willing, to grow amongst the ruins.

 

(The boy she never dared to miss until now.)

 

Cautiously, she reaches out once more, fingers curling into his. The movement is unsure, and she knows Bellamy can sense her hesitation.

 

She’s never been one for comfort (seeking or giving), happy to bottle them up and swallow them down: except the way her heart aches for the boy she first met; the way she replays his words again and again; w _e don’t need A.L.I.E on the Ark, we need you._

 

And here’s the secret she’ll never tell: If she could do it again, she’d do it all the same, from the harsh words to the softest touches, with just one exception.

 

She would tell him they need him too.

 

But this battle-weary boy, with a mind so broken he sees only ghosts.

 

(A soul bargained for what was good and right and true. A soul lost when the cost was death.)

 

She just holds him close and promises silently to never let go.

 

\--

 

Later, after she’s coaxed him to bed, after she hovers on the limits, heaping blanket after blanket over his shivering frame: he drags her down with him, he lets her hold him.

 

Closer and closer and closer, until even the air between them begins to suffocate from stillness.

 

“I forgot what it was to be without her,” he whispers into the darkness, and she hears the way his voice hitches at the end. “I don’t want to forget her face.”

 

(And she knows, then and always, that the thing Bellamy suffers from most, is a heart too big too easy to break.)

 

“Seventy-one days and counting. One thousand, seven hundred and fifty-five to go.”

 

Silence stretches between them, and she listens, intently, as his breathing evens out. She thinks, perhaps, he’s fallen asleep, curled into her, all bones and sharp edges, but then, he mumbles out:

 

“What if they didn’t make it? What if the bunker wasn’t enough?”

 

A fear coiled tight within him: resting heavy on his shoulders as they watched the earth burst into flames.

 

(The spark that lit his soul alight until it burned and burned and burned to ashes.)

 

His hand in hers, she whispers with hope: “But what if they did make it? What if the bunker was enough?”

 

\--

 

She sleeps, fitful, in and out, still not used to the presence of a person crowding her space. He sleeps, long and deep, the ache deep in his heart eased by the kindness of touch, the faith of words.

 

They wake, to a morning, one that feels new.

 

She remembers: the warmth of the sun hitting her face, the smell of dew hanging in the air, the longing for a world she never thought she’d live to touch.

 

He recalls: the softness of his sister resting in his arms, a laugh as she leapt from metal to dirt, the strength in her voice, _may we meet again._

 

“Are you okay?” She asks, hands reaching for his.

 

“No,” He replies, but still reaches for her grip, holding a moment, sure and firm. “But one day I will be.”  


End file.
